The semicontinuous polymerization of methyl methacrylate (MMA) in heterogeneous medium under monomer‐starved conditions is reported here. The effect of monomer addition rate on kinetics, particle size, particle number, and PMMA average molar masses are reported. This process permits the synthesis of high‐solid content latexes containing nano‐sized particles (<40 nm) with narrow particle size distributions [(Dw/Dn) < 1.1]. Moreover, the molar masses (Mn ≈ 0.3–1.2 × 106 g/mol) are much lower than those expected by chain transfer to monomer, which is the typical termination mechanism in 0–1 emulsion and microemulsion reactions. Both particle size and average molar masses decrease as the rate of monomer addition is diminished. Possible explanations for this process are provided. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part A: Polym Chem 45: 1463–1473, 2007

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A simple four-state model containing five-parameters, in conjunction with experimental conversion, particle number density and average molar masses, is presented to reproduce the semicontinuous heterophase polymerization of butyl methacrylate. The model adequately describes the experimental evolutions of conversion, particle size, average number of particles, average number of radicals per particle, and molar mass. A coagulation mechanism was detected and its rate constant was evaluated. The entry coefficient and the critical radical concentration in the aqueous phase were approximately constant and the exit rate coefficient decreased with monomer feed rate. Homogeneous nucleation is the dominant mechanism of production of particles, micellar nucleation occurs at the slowest feeding rate examined.

New oil-in-alcohol highly concentrated emulsions were formulated and were used as a templates to obtain macroporous poly(furfuryl alcohol) monoliths by a one-step method. The oil-in-alcohol highly concentrated emulsions were prepared by stepwise addition of the oil phase to the surfactant-alcohol solution and were characterized by optical microscopy and by laser diffraction. The typical structure of highly concentrated emulsions, with close-packed polyhedral droplets, has been observed. Poly(furfuryl alcohol) monoliths were obtained by polymerizing in the external phase of these emulsions. These materials are mainly macroporous and retain the size distribution and morphology from the highly concentrated emulsions. The internal structure of the monoliths was observed by scanning electron microscopy. The images showed an interconnected network with pore size similar to the droplet size of the highly concentrated emulsions used as templates.